Many workers may find themselves in situations made hazardous by encounters with persons and the places where those encounters occur. One example of an at-risk worker is medical staff who might be required to make house calls on psychiatric patients. Another example is social work staff who might be required to visit clients where there is perceived to be a risk of violence or threat. Yet another example is a bus driver who is at possible risk from his passengers or other drivers he may encounter. There are many other examples. The present invention seeks to provide means whereby the location of the worker and events that happen to the worker can be known and shared.
Even if the events that happen to the worker may be known, it is of little use if the worker cannot be rescued. The present invention seeks to provide monitoring means whereby early intervention is made possible.
An audit trail, verifying what happened, when, and who was involved, is highly desirable but difficult to achieve with personal monitors. The present invention seeks to provide that an audit trail can readily be established.
There is always a risk that an erroneous call might be mistaken for a call from a personal monitor, or that a worker can be deliberately subjected to violence and threat and protected from being monitored by a false monitoring device being introduced in place of the monitoring device which the worker actually uses to make a false call. The present invention seeks to make it impossible to introduce a false monitoring device or to allow accidental monitoring of an erroneous call.
Cellular telephone networks can be very expensive to place traffic over. Long periods of monitoring a personal monitor can be very costly. The present invention seeks to provide that the cost of monitoring the individual can kept to a minimum.
According to one aspect, the present invention provides a monitor and first and second voice servers, the monitor placing a call for a predetermined time to the first server, said first server alerting said second server, and said second server calling said monitor within said predetermined time, said monitor abandoning said call to said first server after said predetermined period, and only being in communication with second server if said second call has been successfully received by said monitor.
The invention also provides that the lone worker monitor is communicable with one or more voice servers, said monitor being operable to place a voice call thereto, and said one or more voice servers being operative automatically to record a call.
The invention also provides that the lone worker monitor is capable of being located by interpolation of mobile telephone signal strengths by measurement of the radiation from the monitor at one or more telephone base stations.
The invention also provides a monitor which, in order to prevent false changing of settings, can only have it settings altered when in a charging cradle or connected directly to a mains charger.
The invention also provides that the settings can be changed by short message service messages.
The invention further provides that the lone worker monitor can be coupled to receive satellite positioning signals, such as, but not limited to, GPS signals, and can be operative to calculate and report the position of the lone worker monitor.
The invention further provides that the lone worker monitor can comprise a camera, that the lens of the camera can be hidden, that the camera can be operative to take one, the other or both of video images and still images, that the lone worker monitor can relay the images from the camera by short range radio link, by GSM technology, by GPRS technology, WAP technology, or by any radio, wireless, cellular ground, satellite, fibre optic or cable communications protocol available now or in the future, or any combination thereof.
The invention further provides that the lone worker monitor can be coupled to communicate with external equipment by means of a short range wireless connection, that the external equipment can be operative to pass information and signals to and from the lone worker monitor, and that the external equipment can be operative to provide some or all of the communications with the cellular telephone network.
The invention further provides that the short range wireless connection can provide passage into and/or out of the lone worker monitor of sound representative signals, and that the short range wireless connection can provide passage out of the lone worker monitor of image representative signals.
The invention further provides that the camera can be provided alone in the lone worker monitor, or that the camera can be provided in conjunction with the microphone.
The invention further provides that the camera can be operated alone in the lone worker monitor, or that the camera can be operated in conjunction with operation of the microphone, or that the microphone can be operated alone in the lone worker monitor.
The invention also provides that the lone worker monitor is communicable with one or more image servers, the lone worker monitor being operable to place an image call thereto, and said one or more image servers being operative automatically to record images from a call.
The invention further provides that image servers can be the same servers as the voice servers.
The invention further provides that the short range wireless connection can be Bluetooth™, and/or that the short range wireless connection can comprise any known or to be developed short range wireless connection means compatible with the requirements of the invention.